15 minutes to flow

11:59 .start.

there's only so many minutes in the day and I find myself struggling to fill them equally with business, projects, tasks, and breaths. in fact, the breaths come only in the last seconds before i fall into sleep, and i think to myself, "this is no way to be living," mimicking the false appearance of peace while drowning. it's true-this semester i am in too deep.

the strange part about existing in the way that i do, with books on my back, words in my mind, questions always weaving around my entire being, is that a crisis teeters right alongside the thrill of not-knowing. the task of uncovering, or rather, establishing one's own meaning is dangerous. it entails a risk of falling into the turbulent seas with no land in sight. as a friend wrote so beautifully tonight, the philosophy that we hold dear flirts with nihilism, and it might be that for the rest of my life i balance on a thin line between truth, reality, and error. but passion gives the tension to stay above the crowd that laughs below, dumbfounded, and transformation grants the slack to sway around stagnation. buffoons can jump up and down, and eventually, we all fall off of the line. the amazing thing is that as i continually catch myself, i sense my heart beating.

i know that i am alive. or at least, i think so, because sometimes it feels to be the case. and really, what more can i ask for then the chance to think through the hours so that while horizons swallow and give birth to suns, i follow along their path and watch possibilities open up? it could seem as though the same roads get traveled, the same obscurities become obstacles, and the same steps are taken such that one travels in circles. thoughtlessly. but i think from experience and believe that each day brings patterns that await to be revealed as freedoms for possibility, growth, and change. a robustness hides behind sunrises and sunsets that might be met differently when one volunteers to release the assumption that it is always only the same thing, all over again.

cycles are tricky. so are tautologies. and apparent end points, like life. and death.

so, while i inch my way to nowhere, carefully, methodically, and without knowing precisely why or when i will get somewhere, i think it is appropriate to remind myself that the practice is in the process. the value is in the clearing. the truth is in the questions. and the meaning is in the making.


12:12 .end.

big thoughts, big feelings

I just returned from the annual SPEP conference. This year it was held in Montreal, Canada.

I decided months ago that I was going to attend even though it's late in the year and stress levels are building as the semester edges toward the end. It was my third time going now, and I was honestly quite nervous about making the trip. Not just because it involved driving in the car for 10 hours there and back, and not just because there are lots of philosophers around (and often it is encouraged that you meet them, seem impressive, and get on their good side). I think I was nervous because every year so far the SPEP trip has involved some very big feelings: for the first two SPEPs I was in the midst of two long, difficult breakups. And last year, loneliness, sadness, and pain were coupled with some of the most excited, giddy feelings that I've ever felt (to the point of acting stupid and silly). Feeling all of this while also being displaced in new cities and trying to find good food is quite the mix. Oh, and then there is the philosophy part of it all.

I explain to people that my favorite part of SPEP is going to sessions to hear about the sort of work that I find most interesting and to see philosophy be done in the way that I think it should be--in collaboration with others who share and discuss their ideas in productive, supportive, and rigorous ways. To that end, I am selective about my session choices. I've come to learn that the kind of people involved in these sorts of things are often more important than the ideas. Similar to how a class description can sound awesome, but the overall experience completely hinges on the person teaching it, SPEP features a decent amount of talks on feminism, sexuality, gender, race, etc., but that doesn't mean it's all good. All of these philosophers, who for such a long time were just names to me, are really just people. Some names I have looked up to as a student in philosophy. Some names were those that inspired me and made me want to do philosophy. But out of these philosopher-people, some are nice, some are awkward, and some are not worth making a trip to Canada to be around. Fortunately, I know some really nice people, and I was able to spend some time with them.

I had dinner with Ladelle McWhorter on my first night there. We spoke for nearly two hours about everything and nothing that I had really anticipated. Philosophy, projects, life, ideas, how things were going. We were supposed to talk about my reading lists for my comp exams and my idea for a dissertation project, but we only managed to sneak that in before I had to run off and make sure that I didn't have a parking ticket in my windshield.

 I told her about my youtube channel and her place in the first video on role models. She didn't think it was creepy. Instead, she thought it was a cool project. I'm glad she approves.

We talked about affect, and the transmission of affect, and the sort of people who transmit a lot of affect. She said I am an affective person, and I told her that I now know that means I can affect people positively and negatively. Then we talked about the size of people's bubbles, the size of towns, and the ontological experience of affecting and being affected by others.(She also assured me that graduate school and small towns make people crazy, so I should expect to be kind of crazy for the next few years.)

The panel on Del's book, "Racism and Sexual Oppression"

 We also managed to talk quite a bit about ways to deal with feelings, especially negative feelings that people don't want to have (like homophobia or racism) and what sort of practices people can undertake in order to be and feel differently than they do. With reference to her most recent genealogy, she mentioned that it wasn't just the research and the writing that changed her, but that there seemed to be new opportunities opening up to her. She recognized them as opportunities, perhaps because she was more attuned to them now, and then she got to know new people. There is a very important hermeneutic connection between how we prime ourselves to see and think and be and feel new things. It's not a metaphysical secret or special power or anything, just something very simple about how we orient ourselves in the world and to what we remain open. It was lovely to talk with her. And it was definitely a highlight of the trip.

I went to a paper by my advisor, Shannon Sullivan. I wanted to see how she handled the responses to her work since I expected it to be rowdy. Just as I hoped, she responded with clarity, coolness, and with a very obviously genuine air of wanting to learn and hear from the audience members' comments, despite the fact that some people in the audience responded with overt sarcasm, an inability to listen, and immature hyperbole.  I have good role models.

And I had a meeting with another new mentor, Sharon Meagher, about Public Philosophy. I am currently working with her to set up the Public Philosophy Network. She's committed, dedicated, passionate, and competent. I appreciate seeing her influence and witnessing the involvement from other philosophers who are interested in transforming the discipline of philosophy.

Another highlight of the trip was seeing my friend, Ami. She is one of the loveliest individuals I have ever met. I only wish that we could see each other for more than one dinner, one night, once a year.

Look at us two years ago with Del; PIKSI 2009

But I ended up with some very weird anxieties, too. The philosophy world is so small! The same people go to these conferences year after year, and they are the ones who write the books, edit the journals, teach the classes...so if you are great, everyone knows you. If you do something stupid, everyone can know what you did. And if people love you or hate you, they often have the capacity to devolve to high school mentalities. I hope this is only my perception as a grad student who has only been three times now, but I am fearful that there are the popular kids, the weird kids, the loner kids who circle the perimeter of the receptions, and the bullies. I am worried that this is going to be my (very small) world and I will be a part of it. Given my talk with Del and our discussion on being crazy, bubbles are bumping up against bubbles here in a serious way.

And another thing: SPEP is one of the only things that I have really experienced that I can safely bet will be a part of my life for the rest of my time in philosophy. Every year I will go and I will see the same people; slowly I will become one of the old philosophers and new graduate students will be attending. They, like me now, will be poor, sleeping on the hallway floor in someone's apartment in town after driving across the border because they can't afford plane tickets or rooms in the conference hotel. Even though I love philosophy and there are good people, the thought of growing old at SPEP year after year weirded me out. I can't imagine having  kids or even having a house with as much surety about how its going to be since I haven't yet had a kid or owned a house. But now I have been to three SPEP conferences. And it will probably be much like that, year after year. Until I quit or I die. And that is strange.

NATIONAL TV!!!!

Who would have thought that my first ever appearance on national television would be on ESPN of all channels, and during a football game nonetheless!?! I haven't even been to a PSU game, and I don't intend to.

But one thing does make sense: I love food and I love to eat. So, Yun and I went to lunch at one of our favorite date places, Herwigs, where they just happened to be filming a feature for the "Taste of the Town" segment and asked if we would participate.

You can find it here.

By the way, this also means that two big lesbians (on a lunch date) were on ESPN last night.

And here's the proof that I finished my plate!

Figuring Out the Mainstream

I have been slowly putting more and more attention into developing my own youtube channel. I actually started one over a year ago, I just never did anything with it. But now I am feeling slightly more motivated, a little bit more brave, and increasingly more impatient with my lack of public participation in important issues. So, I launched a new one. I only have a test video up and the audio is out of sync, but I am now trying to figure out some of the ins and outs of how to utilize the public domain of youtube.

You can find the channel here.

As of 10.28, I have added a video for the "It Gets Better" Project.

The problem of not-knowing, or knot-knowing

Life and experience are rich with opacities. Nietzsche and Dewey are some of my favorite guys who stated that simple explanations which claim to report on the reality of the world will always be falsifications. Nothing is ever clear, easy, and evident. There will always be mysteries, gaps, disconnects...Donna Haraway also referred to the idea of the world as a trickster-coyote, a subject-world with which we must converse in order to understand, but that has its own ability to deceive, to mislead, to play tricks. The world is not an object-thing that we can study thoroughly and know everything, or increasingly more about. The world and our experiences in it are elusive, partial, and decidedly unclear. Furthermore, following Nietzsche, why would we want to know truths? Why not errors? Why not deception? Why not falsity? Well, he's quick to say that we may not be able to handle it if we realized that the "truths" we hold on to so dearly are precisely that- errors.

As of late, I've been in a position of not-knowing. Not just failing to know everything, but really not knowing much at all. Not just partially understanding things, but seriously considering the possibility that I have completely misunderstood some very important things, that my perceptions have been delusional, that whatever I do "know" is misshapen, misinformed, and very, very confused. When it comes to knowing oneself, a standard reason for engaging in philosophy, an awareness to one's not-knowing is a bit treacherous. And when it comes to knowing others, not-knowing presents a very precarious place to find oneself. Especially if we are to trust others, depend on others, befriend others, and become their lovers.

What is one to do? Trust in what you thought you knew? Trust in what others tell you? Trust your "instincts," whatever says your gut?

The problem with all of this trusting and feeling, is that they are not pure and untainted either. I have a conflicted relationship with what the feelings deep down in our gut can tell us. (This is a project that I will be pursuing for many years of dissertation writing. Stay tuned.) Sometimes you get a "vibe" about a person and you are right, but other times, your "intuition" is completely off, even hurtful to others. So, I can't trust my gut. But my gut isn't clear anyway. The only thing my gut gives me is even more of a sense of tight, queasy, yucky, icky, nauseating not-knowing. It feels like a knot in my tummy that can't tell me anything but simply that I don't know. Hence, it's a knot-knowing. And it's not very helpful when I am trying to figure what to make of all this "life" and the experiences that I am having.

So then what?

We crave to know the truth about things, and once we feel like we have a handle on it, we *feel* better. One of my heroes, Ladelle McWhorter, wrote that the need to know, the urgency with which we want to know, is a bodily thing. We feel the need to know deep in our quivering bones, our shallow lungs, and our tense stomachs.  And for me, if I can't get a handle on what is going on with me, others, or me with others, I feel it in my body as a bad consequence. I get inflammation in my wrist, an infection in my lungs, scars on my skin, and acid in my stomach.

From what I can tell right now, I have two options:

1) I can tell myself a simple, easy, coherent story about the truth of what is going on. I may feel better, but it comes from a simplification, and hence, a falsification of reality.

2) I can sit with the knot-knowing and try to transform it from nausea (and illness) to a patient bodily presence. This means that I may not (ever) settle on the truth, but it frustrates the bodily need to know "everything" (or anything, for that matter).

Regarding 1), I could side with Nietzsche and ask, "Well,whoever decided that truth was better than error anyway? Maybe there is something more to be said about error." And as for 2), I've been sitting with this tense knot in my gut for months now trying to make it a calm, attentive bodily presence. If health isn't at risk, maybe I can continue on with it for a bit longer.

Fall Down, Fall Apart, Fall Into It

It's another October which means the leaves around central Pennsylvania are aflame, rich in yellows, oranges, and becoming bold reds, even purples. The autumn colors are vibrant, but all of this is preparation for the coming winter. Winters here are long, bitter cold, and very wet. The sun is scarce, and it's hard to avoid a bit of seasonal depression. For the past two winters I think I have mustered the cold just fine, but the transition into December with finals, and then January with the start of a new semester, has also brought immeasurable weight in emotional upheavals, personal challenges, and hard times that require personal growth in order to avoid a breaking. It's a counter-intuitive reaction to the natural seasons for the sake of survival. Grow and be strongest through the winter, for they seem to bring the threat of snapping limbs and branches.

So, this October, I fear another uneasy transition from fall into winter. Faced with few other options than to simply roll with the rotation of the earth and the pace of a natural transition, I am trying to suspend my fears and trust that winters are easier if you have another source of heat in addition to one's own. Friends, family, lovers bring a bit of warmth.

I've always known that I could learn from the trees. They have patterns. They have strength. They give lots of things--shade, colors, sway, and silhouettes. They also have roots.

Here's to the hope that I can take another fall with grace.

Knowing the Negative Side of Things

From today:

Q: What is something that people need to know about you in order to really know you?

A: The negative.

Not in the sense that I am dark, depressed, or pessimistic, but in the sense that there is always another side, another way to see something. I know that I can come off in bright, clear colors. I have strong angles, hard edges at times, and a bluntness most of the time. But the directness, the clarity of my form, and the passions that provide bold outlines are only the most readily apparent parts of who I am. If one cannot see the negative space that occurs around the lines, between, and behind those clear lines, they will not know the whole picture of me.

But I think this goes for knowing anything.

We look for clear lines when we should be more sensitive to the spaces.

We hear words when we should be listening to the silences.

We demand the obvious when we should be open to the ambiguities.

We want the facts when we might benefit from acknowledging mysteries. 




And I seem to be reminded of this daily.